Children train the community to wash its hands of disease

Tuesday, December 13, 2016

"We are well aware that current hygiene standards in the community leave a lot to be desired, with people leaving the toilet without washing their hands. It’s what drove me personally to join the other children from across the area who were signing up for World Vision's training on bodily hygiene and handwashing. Now we are known as 'peer educators' and our job is to pass on what we have learned!

I'm 16 years old and I live in Mbadakhoune. The training has enabled us to inform our peers and local people about the threat from illnesses spread by dirty hands such as diarrhoea, dysentry and ebola. The purpose of the training is to wipe out these illnesses, and with the support of World Vision we have started to get the adults and children in our villages up to speed about good hygiene practices such as the Tippy Taps."

The benefits of the Tippy Taps

The Tippy Tap is a foot-operated facility for washing hands consisting of an empty 5-litre container, three stakes and a cord. We set them up at key points around the village and display them with the easy-to-follow instructions that we learned in training. If the community manages to get into the habit of using them, it will be much easier to control these illnesses, as nothing spreads them faster than dirty hands.

Mbadakhoune is situated in the department of Mbirkelane, where agriculture is the communities main source of income. Small business thrives in the area and  there is a market every two weeks This environment creates a free-for-all for disease, as people come from all over in order to buy and sell goods – frequently meeting and greeting each other with unwashed hands.

Aissatou and the peer educators in full activity of presentation

Handwashing only remains an  issue because the community has still not taken it up as regular habit. Changing customs, traditions and even bad habits is very difficult, and this exactly why certain illnesses are still going strong. Making ordinary people realise this is the only way to motivate them to wash their hands after using the toilet, as well as before and after eating. The Tippy Taps make it easier for them to remember.

To make a Tippy Tap, you need an empty 5-litre plastic container, about a metre of cord, a dozen small bars of soap or else a large bar that you can divide up, some 5-litre containers, wire, stakes (two forked, one straight), and a 1m stick.

Peer educators on a mission

Working with the Coordinator of the local committee for child protection (LCCP) in Mbadakhoune, the peer educators spent their summer holidays getting the message out to local villages. This made such an impression that villagers were immediately asking for hand-washing facilities to be set up in homes and outside mosques.

"To reach the maximum number of people and get disease under control we need to spread Tippy Taps through villages far and wide, with the help of LCPC peer educators," spells out Ousman, a community elder who has had the set-up put into his home." In the past we used to leave the toilets without washing our hands, but since the LCPC coordinator and children have passed through the village to tell us about bodily hygiene and to set up some Tippy Taps, we have started to adopt better handwashing habits."

Presentation and implementation of the TYPPY TAPP during sensitization.

The sense of initiative and community spirit that Aïssatou shares with the other peer educators is something that World Vision is keen to encourage and nurture. This kind of training will be implemented in all areas of World Vision’s activities, where it will make a long-term impact on community health and the well-being of vulnerable children.

Photo credits: Pierre Tatiana Ndione & Angelina Uloma Nwachukwu